Montana

After leaving the canyon area on the east side of the park, we drove west until we hit the Montana border. The scenery was spectacular:

Traffic was a nightmare, though!


This little one was smart enough to stay out of the road.


His older relatives decided it was their road and they'd cross it when they pleased. Really, it's hard to argue with something that big.



Twice during this part of the drive we stopped on the side of the road because crowds had gathered reporting a bear sighting. Sadly, we didn't see any bears. Not, that is, until we were driving back to the hotel. At dusk in Grand Tetons park we rounded a bend in the road shaded by pines and this little fellow was loping along:

This is a juvenile black bear. Notice that we were intelligent tourists and did not get out of the car to see the bear that was was five, or fewer, feet away.

After taking this shot I looked up and realized just HOW close the bear was outside my car window. He was skittish and as soon as an RV pulled up, the bear ran off into the trees.

Now having been to Estes Park countless times since we moved to Colorado, we're sort of jaded when it comes to elk and we saw a lot of elk on our trip to Yellowstone. These guys were so pretty, though, we had to stop to take a few shots.